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Amazon should take a closer look at how they’re shipping hard drives, because the current plan just isn’t working.

I live in California and my best friend lives in Connecticut. For Christmas I sent him a 500GB Western Digital drive, from Amazon.com.

When he received the package, the drive had been damaged and was not usable. Most likely because it was packed without any protective padding at all! (See attached picture). Aside from the single plastic bubble, there was nothing to prevent the drive from being damaged.

My friend had the drive RMA’d from Amazon, and told the Amazon representative what had happened. When the second drive arrived, he was astonished to discover that it was packed exactly the same way! Once again, no protective wrapping/padding, and the drive was again damage in transit.

On his second call to Amazon, he was told by the rep that “we can not guarantee” that it would ship safely, and was offered a store credit. Which makes me wonder, what’s the point of store credit if you can’t get undamaged products!

Shortly after his call, Amazon sent me an automated email requested feedback on their customer service. I replied with the following:

— This sensitive electronic device was shipped without protection, and arrived damaged. After being RMA’d, it was again shipped without protection!

An Amazon representative could not guarantee that if it was again RMA’d that it would be shipped correctly, and offered store credit. This is unacceptable. All I want is the drive to be shipped correctly. —

Hope this is of interest to you!

Cheers,
Joshua

Say what you will about annoying “packing peanuts,” in this case they would have saved the hard drive. Unless there’s something else you want from Amazon, we think you should ask for a refund, rather than store credit. That way you can buy the hard drive from a retailer that can figure out how to package it properly. Like you said, what’s the point of store credit from a place that can’t ship what you want without breaking it?